Monday, November 12, 2012

A disappointing story of 2 DNF reads

I wasn't enjoying the structure of the book - the way important things
were skipped over and discussed in retrospect rather than taking me
through them. Given that the book was about a pair of friends heading
to Hawaii for what would have been his honeymoon with the woman who had
an affair with her (now ex) husband, why skip over the first 2 days of
their week away?

Second, given that I have a (somewhat) legal
background, I also had some problems with the heroine saying that she
wanted to be involved in family law rather than criminal law because
criminal law had "too much grit and violence and pain". Um, hello? Do
you know what families can do to each other? Sure, criminal can be
brutal but so can family law. If you want away from grit and violence
and pain, try corporate or tax law or patent law. Stay far away from
family law.

The last straw was when the MC's started talking about their intimate parts in the third person.

"She says just tell him to go slow this time, be good." she whispered.

"He is hers to command."

Ew.

It wasn't awful but I just couldn't be bothered reading anymore. Life's too short. DNF.

I'm so sad about this one. I tried. Twice. But the narration is so bad that I just can't. Sorry.

There is NO differentiation in the character voices at all. I can't tell the difference between Lizzy or Jared or Matt or Brian or Jared's mum talking. Nada. There is also very little expression in the delivery.

There are almost no vocal pauses between sentences - which makes distinguishing the voices even harder because there is no cue in the timing/delivery. It is the audio equivalent of everything in the whole chapter being one giant paragraph. Not enjoyable.

I love this book. I refuse to ruin the experience by keeping on listening to such bad narration. I'm sad because I was so hoping to enjoy the whole series again except on audio - Strawberries for Dessert is my favourite in the series. If I'm this upset about Promises, I can't imagine how I'd feel about that one. The narrator is the same for the whole series sadly.

Dreamspinner: you need better narrators.

Read the book - the book is excellent. Audiobook is a total fail for me though. :(

Actually, this wasn't the book I was tweeting about - it was Caught Running by Madeleine Urban and Abigail Roux - a book (again) I enjoyed in print but the audiobook was pretty ordinary. Different narrator (Jeff Gelder). I was able to get through it so I guess that's a step up from Promises on audio but not by much really.

I don't plan on listening to anymore Dreamspinner audiobooks unless they get better narrators.

I've read Unleashed only a while ago, too and wasn't much impressed by it, just like you. But keep on reading this series!! The next book will have a tattoeed and pierced (you know where) hero! ;) I really liked it and the third in the series was just released and I enjoyed it a lot, too. It feel as if the 2nd and 3rd book are written by another author. lol